Sayonara' isn't enough
by AlienYak
Summary: How do you react when the most important person in your life's gone? Set after end of manga, spoilers. No pairings.


A/N: This was written after I found out the ending of Yugioh manga. After that, I spent quite some time crying and mourning (literally). On further reflection, the ending probably isn't as sad as I interpreted, since with my limited knowledge I can barely read any of the Japanese on it, but the pictures are very painful, in a beautiful way. It certainly isn't a piece of art, and wasn't intended to be. Honestly, I just wanted to make myself feel better about the ending, though I hope someone out there might also like it.  
  
I've incorporated a lot of things that may seem quite odd. Please excuse these sentimental whims, though I'll explain some of them at the end of the story. Would anyone be interested in beta-reading, giving the story a better ending, or just improve it in general?  
  
If anyone can read Japanese, and has seen the ending of the manga, could they please tell me exactly what happens?  
  
Disclaimer: I don't own Yugioh...  
  
'Sayonara' isn't enough  
  
One month, two weeks and four days.  
  
Suguroku ji-chan looked up at the irritatingly cheerful chime, exuberance replaced by bitter weariness. He saw what he expected. "Aa, Anzu-chan."  
  
"Ohayo, ji-chan." Tired eyes seemed to falter further at the words. "Yuugi...?"  
  
"Still sleeping," he confirmed, fingers tapping on the cracked glass counter. Once, he would have had two grandsons to help him fix it; now, not even one. Don't disturb him; he's tired.  
  
"Can I go up to wait for him?" Aren't we all?  
  
"You don't have to Anzu-chan. School starts soon." He nevertheless opened the door leading to the stairs and motioned for her to go up it. This had become quite a regular routine for them both. You've got your own mourning to do.  
  
"It's ok," she replied, with a phony smile that failed. She walked up the stairs, almost slouching as she went. I need to do this.  
  
The room -and it's current, defeated state- had become painfully familiar. Light filtered through the window in the sloped roof, but halted before the menacing, black curtain barrier set there. There was little light to see by; no artificial light was permitted to shine once Yuugi was asleep, if only to prolong that single peaceful mode he had not entirely relinquished. The air was cold and icy, dead. The room was filled with acrid smells, the result of not allowing fresh air to enter for an extended period of time. Coughing, she struggled to breathe in this oxygen-deficient atmosphere, sealed off by cloth, bricks and wood. Her imagination? Possibly.  
  
Clothes littered the floor carelessly. She ignored them, crossing to the desk to pick up the one garment draped carefully over the back of the chair: a school jacket. The fabric burned her as she buried her nose into its hold. A scent, musky sweet, should have been there. Mou hitori no Yuugi -not Atemu- had been the last one to wear this particular jacket. She knew, because she was the one who'd caught Yuugi smelling it desperately, almost tearing it into threads. Rescuing the tortured item of clothing, she'd caught the words he'd thrown: "He's gone... completely gone..."  
  
That statement had scorched them both, in a way the sealing of Atemu -not mou hitori no Yuugi- had not. She'd looked around the room, at the creased photos with empty gaps, at the notebooks with missing words when Yuugi had coerced his other half to do his homework, at the faded poker deck cards. As though everything that was mou hitori no Yuugi had disappeared with Pharaoh, giving those left behind no physical memory of mou hitori no Yuugi.  
  
"No..." A hand flew to her purse and pried out photos. Skimming through, ravenous for a glimpse at the departed spirit, she could feel herself crying as picture after picture yielded more empty spaces where he'd once stood. The park, the arcade, Kaibaland... nothing. But she remembered those pictures, had spent hours looking over them to cherish memories. A surprised expression here, a bored look there, distracted at times, irritated at others... nothing at all. A scream of frustration tore as she flung them, breathing hard after the spontaneous action. Looking up to see her tears mirrored upon Yuugi's face.  
  
It was then that she noticed the real mirror had been shattered.  
  
"I... can't look... Every time I do... it's as though mou hitori no... boku... is there." Yes, she knew that feeling. It was what she felt... saw... every time she looked at Yuugi. Perhaps that was why everyone else rarely visited, and never stayed. Never stayed...  
  
"Yuugi..."  
  
"He's not there... imasen. Imasen, imasen, imasen!" Amethyst glared at the broken glass, as though it were somehow the mirror's failed duty to bring Yami no Yuugi back.  
  
"Yuugi, yamete!" Her eyes widened as he covered his ears and shut his eyes, the same idea repetitively slicing out. Imasen, imasen, imasen... "Onegai, yamete!"  
  
"Do you know?" she asked the jacket resting in her hands. "What you left behind? Atemu." A deep intake of breath as she swung the garment around her shoulders, skin singeing through multiple layers of cloth at the fraught meaning behind the action. Closing her eyes, she let her head fall to the side, holding the jacket as a shield against the deathly mood. It proved ineffective, only serving to send icy shudders through her. Liquid dotted her own uniform.  
  
"Malik found Bakura-kun last night, a bottle of pills next to him," she murmured. "Overdose. He called me -of course, since I'm the only one with a cell phone- and we took Bakura-kun to hospital. No pulse... he had no bloody pulse! How he's still breathing... I read his journal. I know I shouldn't, but after seeing his apartment... so empty. Even the whole Monster World desk was gone! Sort of like this." She motioned the room in which she stood.  
  
"He's estranged from his family, alone, and everyone else's too caught up in their own troubles to notice! His other half... everything of him disappeared too! ...there was no suicide note, and the doctors say he probably hadn't deliberating overdosed, but... gods!" Sniffling pathetically, she cleared her throat and plunged on, wanting to release the information stored in her.  
  
"Malik's life was promised to you, Atemu, from before birth. Now you're gone, but you never gave him freedom. The markings on his back... they'll never go away, even with plastic surgery. He actually went and asked about it, and even contemplated just burning it all off! Isis-san and Rishid-san managed to convince him otherwise, because they know it'll never break his duty to you. You're sealed, right? Pharaoh... why do you have such power over us even when you're 3000 years from your time, even from your resting place? No one should have so much power!"  
  
"Kaiba-kun, your fated rival... you left before he could defeat you. There's nothing left for him in Duel Monsters now... you destroyed his love for playing. No opponents, no new cards, no new strategies... he collected every single recorded fight you've been in, and stored the data into a computer, but... a computer-generated duel could never satisfy him. He'd need to see that gleeful smirk when you foil his strategies, that pained expression when you're backed into a corner, the adrenaline when you reveal your winning combination, your smug yet thoughtful look as you chide him for focusing on winning... all that. A computer? Never."  
  
"Jounouchi's the same. Doesn't care anymore, doesn't care when his sister tries to comfort him, when his drunkard of a father yells or when his mother demands to know why, when Mai tried to ask him out. Do you know what he told her? Can you see from your pedestal, your throne? He told her he was unworthy, because he'd given up Duel Monsters and has nothing else to offer. Real duelist... you were the epitome of a real duelist to him, and where are you now? His inspiration, his goal, his future... vanishing behind a stone wall!"  
  
Her voice was raised, shouting in a way that was quiet but cutting as she tried to release her pent-up emotions without waking up the room's other occupant. She couldn't see, not with the thick veil of tears blindfolding her as she tried to form coherent words. Poison was pouring from her, the poison that had been fed to her by her friends or their families. She didn't want to know, didn't want to hear about how another of them succumbed to Pharaoh's shadow, how another of them gave up something important. Her hands fell to her sides, and the jacket slid off, pooling around her feet and drowning them. Whispers emitted from her numb lips.  
  
Imasen, imasen, imasen...  
  
"Yuugi... do I need to say anything? You practically disowned him. Your other half... no. As you said, Atemu, Yuugi is not another you. Yuugi is Yuugi, but you are Yuugi too! He loves you... gods, how can he -we- not? He wanted you to be happy, but kami-sama, how could you? You've shared the same body, the same path, the same damn heart. Yet you give all that up! Ji- chan lost two grandsons when you left... don't you know? He's dying, just as Bakura-kun is fighting in a coma! Ironic, isn't it, that he was the one who ended up in a coma. If that is karma, what will happen to Yuugi? Dead, or mad? Both? Will you drive him to that, Pharaoh? Can you hear him now, or has he been sealed as a memory, in the past and not to be bothered with?"  
  
"Independence... this price is too high to pay. Too much.  
  
"And I... you probably don't want to hear about me. I could stand it though, maybe, if only I wasn't being used as a makeshift counsellor. Everyone's talking to me, telling me about everything I don't want to know! Do they think I don't miss you too? Not miss that feeling of security, or that sense of impending doom that somehow always follows you? That I don't want to drag you out through the town, a little disappointed at your aloofness but still happy to be with you? How I can always see both Yuugis at the same time, something that never fails to thrill me?"  
  
"Your future, in your past? Why aren't you here then, Atemu? Are we cut so surgically out of your glorious future, Ou-sama? Why isn't your future with us, but with your past? Long-dead priests, from when the pyramids were still white... you have friends here, don't you? This world is no less your home now than Egypt, isn't it? Or is your innate nostalgia too much for you to forgo your ancient home for what you have waiting for you in the present?"  
  
Faintly, she could see spray cans lined against the walls, their use evident by the hieroglyphs staining the walls. Occasionally in the mess, she could make out the shadows of a staircase or door drawn; some were upright, some sideways, some upside down. Upon each door was emblazoned the eye of Ra, a symbol that mocked her. He had disappeared behind one of those doors marked with the sun god's eye. And like these fake, 2-dimensional doors, there was no way she could get through.  
  
A poor replica of Yami no Yuugi's soul room. She understood. Without the magic of the Sennen Puzzle, Yuugi could not access his own soul room, let alone the other room that had existed within his heart. Yet there was a time where he could freely walk within both, when he was never refused admittance to either. Now there was probably nothing of that other soul room remaining, though if the current situation continued, there would be very little in his own remaining.  
  
Imasen, imasen, imasen...  
  
She stepped over to the bed, looking at her sleeping friend. As always, the change was frightening. When awake, Yuugi was drawn from lack of appetite, his eyes an eerie, almost glowing crimson that seemed almost permanent. Skin was ashen from a lack of sun, and his entire being was lost and barren. Yet when he slept, a healthy aura was wrapped around him, and a smile graced his face. What did he dream of, that the difference could be so profound, so tangible? No, she could not ask. Not when he'd just woken, with clear amethyst eyes shining, and a pure grin. Not when the former clouded over with red smoke, and the latter disappeared as he looked at her in confusion.  
  
"Ohayo, Anzu." Quiet, fading voice, an ominous sign. Mou hitori no boku wa doko ni iruka?  
  
"O... hayo, Yuugi." No, she couldn't watch him break before her again, as he sat up and looked around. She couldn't watch him die again, as he realised why his other self wasn't there to wake him up, teasing him about being late to school. As he remembered that his dream wasn't real, that what was real was not what he wanted. I'm sorry.  
  
"Mou hitori no boku wa... imasen." Uso!  
  
The fatal word left his mouth, followed by a torrent of blood that splattered over the already soaked blankets. Amethyst swirled with turbulence, and his skin changed once more to grey. Shoulders slumped, and he trembled as emotions were forced out of him in the form of blood and tears. He was too dejected to care, as salted liquid mingled with salted liquid, diluting and concentrating respectively. Not again... Yuugi!  
  
"Yuugi! Iya!" She thumped his back when he choked on the red syrup, knocking it out of his mouth. More followed; she kept hitting, hoping she could stop it. "Onegai, don't do this! Please!"  
  
"Mou hitori no boku... he left..." The mumbled words were somehow audible to her through the coughing. Perhaps because she knew what he would say, as he had every other time she'd found him sleeping.  
  
"Daijoubu, Yuugi. Daijoubu," she whispered fiercely, drawing upon her own emotions to comfort her friend. It was always her that they came to.  
  
"It was so real... so real... I could see him perfectly. Mou... no. Atemu- san. Pharaoh. Standing there in his royal attire, smiling at me like mou hitori no boku did... so warm, so sweet... protective and friendly. But mou hitori no boku is dead. Atemu-san killed him..."  
  
Funny how he could say it without conviction, that Pharaoh had destroyed his amnesiac other half. Funny that he could separate Atemu and mou hitori no Yuugi so clearly... but this was Yuugi, who knew his other self better than anyone else. Sinking into my uniform and soaking it in tears, allowing her to do the same to him. Funny that she understood why he tried his hardest to evade sleep, if only to avoid the lies he saw in his dreams. Funny that Bakura-kun had tried the exact opposite, had tried to sleep as much as possible to see the fake alternate universe in his mind.  
  
Imasen, imasen, imasen...  
  
"The puzzle's gone, along with all the other Sennen items... buried when Atemu-san left. That was so... 'Sayonara' really isn't enough, is it? Mou hitori no boku... neither of them are ever coming back.... never ever ever... zutto... I can still hear whispers from him. I guess I had the puzzle for so long, grew so attached, that burying it wasn't enough to stop this noise. But I don't want this anymore! Not anymore..."  
  
Could she ever break that bond enough for her friend to recover? It seemed so unlikely, with so many possiblities, so many problems. If she could break through... "Yuugi, Bakura-kun's in hospital..."  
  
The weeping stopped as he stared up at her. "Na-nani?"  
  
"Coma. He... took too many sleeping pills." Amethyst widened further. "The doctors have no idea if -when- he'll wake up... they can't understand why he's living, even when he has no pulse." She paused, and fingered Yuugi's wrist. "Kind of like you, really... living without a heartbeat." Funny how the blood from her friend's mouth was slowing, as if being distraught about Bakura-kun was somehow stemming the flow.  
  
"We have to go see him! Minna..."  
  
"They don't know yet," she cut in quickly. "Except Malik, who found Bakura- kun. They should be at school already." Leave them.  
  
"Sou... I forgot that mou hitori no Bakura was lost too." Less, and less, and less... was that a pulse?  
  
"We have to keep living. Mou... hitori no anata would want us to keep living. Ne?"  
  
"Living, when we've been left behind?"  
  
She opened his drawer and found the abandoned Duel Monsters deck. Flipping through the cards that were solely Yuugi's, she picked out the particular card and laid it before him. Shishasosei... Resurrection. He stared at it, a disbelieving sort of joy in his eyes. Had he forgotten the last message he'd given Atemu, or had he lost faith in his own card? In himself?  
  
"Yes, even when Atemu left us here and moved on. We'll just have to catch up to him, or wait until he's ready to come back to us... someday."  
  
Blood flow had dried up completely, and the beat beneath the skin was stronger. A sincere look of interest crossed Yuugi's face as he climbed out of bed and began looking for some clothes. She exited and closed the door, continually to talk. His voice transgressed the stone and wood barrier.  
  
"Someday... in the future..."  
  
Bakura-kun was the first to completely succumb to the curse -or legacy- left for us. Oddly enough, this seemed to snap Yuugi out of his dazed reverie, reminding him that his other friends were each suffering in their own ways and prompting him to do something about it. Helping would allow him to... forget? Recover? Whatever it achieved, it would hopefully be enough for them all.  
  
After all, Atemu would be very surprised if we all visited him so soon, ne?  
  
A/N: Yes, quite a few sentimental whims.  
  
Japanese: 'Ohayo' - greeting, usually used in the morning. 'Imasen' - not there, referring to living things. Gomen to Sakana for stealing her term, though using it in a completely different context. 'Yamete' - "Stop" 'Onegai; - "Please" 'Ou-sama' - King 'Mou hitori no boku wa doko ni iruka?' - "Where is the other me?" 'Uso' - lie, commonly used when you don't want to believe something. 'Iya' - "No!" 'Daijoubu' - "It's alright" 'Sayonara'- Goodbye, farewell 'Nani' - What 'Minna' - everyone 'Shishasosei' - Japanese card version of 'Reborn the Monster'  
  
I originally wanted to write the story in Anzu P.O.V, but then decided against it because I can't do first person. It's still kind of first person- ish, except that I use 'she' instead of 'I'. The italics are thoughts, those ones where you don't want to voice what you really think but other people understand anyway. And the part before she starts to talk to the jacket is a flashback.  
  
I put the bleeding thing in because for some odd reason, I had blood noses the night I found out the ending, and the night after. They seemed to get worse whenever I was feeling particularly sad... or was that my imagination? Anyway, I thought to add that in, and make a few moderations.  
  
I hate good, realistic dreams, though they're ok when you think they're real. It's when you wake up and it takes an hour to realise that no, it wasn't real and no, it probably won't ever happen, that they really, really suck.  
  
I did have a weird dream the night after I found out the ending, where Ryou was in hospital after an overdose of pills. Malik was in there somewhere too. Funny how I trust my blurry, unclear dreams more than the clear ones. I did have a clear one where a story got updated. Didn't happen. --  
  
Seriously though, if anyone knows exactly what happens at the end of Yugioh manga, could they please tell me? Why do Atemu and Yuugi duel? What happens to Yami no Bakura? And what exactly is the significance of Shishasosei, apart from it being a 'last message'? And why does Yuugi have the puzzle (and Yami no Yuugi, I think) back in the Yugioh Series R? WHAT'S GOING ON?! 


End file.
